Dying bees, pre-Columbian pollination, etc.?

Question

CBS Sunday Morning today reported on the dying bee phenomenon. Without bees, they said, the crops, including apples and pumpkins, can't be pollinated. Yet the report said bees are not native to America; the white man brought them over. Native Americans called bees "white man's flies".

Now pumpkins are native to America; they were here before the whites. Therefore, how did the pumpkin blossoms, and the berries, and other vegetation native to this land get polinated before the bees came? Butterflies? Flies? Crickets? Grasshoppers? Hummingbirds?

Also, if the bees are gone, couldn't we get the butterflies, hummingbirds, etc., to pollinate our crops?

Answer 1

There are quite a few native pollinators such as bumble bees, some flies, and many others. These pollinators were sufficient until large scale agriculture required large scale pollination. The problem with using other pollinators such as butterflies and hummingbirds is they can't be managed as easily as honeybees and they aren't as good at pollinating certain crops if they'll even show interest in our agricultural endeavors. I wouldn't worry about bees "disappearing" though. The honeybee population has waxed and waned since these bees were introduced. This is just another bump in the cycle.

Answer 2

There are native wasps that probably filled (and still fill) this role. It is sad that european bees are dying out, but much of the story gets airtime because many farmers use bees as a source of income, not to mention that all the honey we get comes from these bees. There will be a lot of economic impact.